SPOTLIGHT: Great Blogger of the Month (2012)
The Great Blogger of the Month award is an honor given to a blogger who has that right type of presence (delivers quality), staying power (keeps people coming back), and charisma in their blogs. It is an honor to be presented with awards such as this and is presented by James Daniel Walsh instead of Les. February The first winner of Great Blogger of the Month goes to Shibby. Shibby is one of Manic Expressions reviewers that is a professional when it comes to talking about his series "Let's Talk About Hockey" . He doesn't use any jokes, punchlines, or one-liners; he is a man representing hockey in a great light of history. "Yes, Shibby, the king of all things hockey on this site. His Let's Talk About Hockey series was one of the earliest video series to make it here to Manic Expression, and he’s already been honored with an Outstanding Blog of the Week for them. So why pick on him again? Because he’s just that good. Any of you who’ve seen Let's Talk About Hockey know that its about as comprehensive a history of a sport you’ll find anywhere. Give this man a budget so he could do a few interviews and this series is ready to be premiered on ESPN or the History Channel." March The Fanfic Critic is one of the admins of the site and what she does for her show is completely original. Instead of reviewing big movies, video games, or anything else that is universally relateable to anyone watching reviews of them, she takes on peoples personal works of their own: fanfics. "When I wrote Stop the Hate at TGWTG, I always just assumed the FanFic Critic was an official contributor at that site. Her videos had production values just as good as many of the “made men” there, and she was so prolific. I was shocked to find out she’d never been picked up. Who would put that much time and energy into their work if they weren’t being paid for it? Someone who loves what she does, that’s who. Someone less interested in money than she is in entertaining people. Someone who shrugs off troll attacks, no matter how vicious, and keeps on doing what she loves. Not only does Megan do what she loves, but she makes it a point to make sure others can too. She gives 110% to her work, and she expects the same of us. Average is not good enough for her. She expects us to be our best." April Ratin8tor is one of the most unique and intelligent members of Manic Expression. His articles, "In Too Deep" make his readers interests peak in his over analysis of pop culture. This often includes over thinking about God, crossovers between big franchises and how revolutionary they would be, and noticing plot holes in the most successful and seemingly perfect movies. He resides from New Zealand and even outside of the Internet, he challenges his own teachers. Always analyzing new things and making others think, Ratin8tor is one of the great bloggers on the site. A valuable member who contributes his popular In Too Deep series to this site, Ratin8tor is watching every move I make in regard to how this site is run. When I announced my plan to revamp the front page, giving regular series more prominant display, it was Ratin8tor who correctly warned me that doing so might alienate the more casual bloggers. I asked him if he wanted to become an admin, to help sort through what we should do. He turned me down. Instead he took his fears directly to you all by posting in the forum and asking what you guys thought. I'm glad he did.I get an email from Ratin8tor every so often, challenging me on one thing or another. When I announced our site anniversary would be a documentary, everyone was excited except Ratin8tor. He thought we should publish a book of our best blogs, to give the writers here more of a voice. Not a bad idea. I asked him if he knew of how we could do that, and he told me he didn't. He was just an idea man."' May '''Oliver Judd', a resident of the UK, has become a very helpful member of the site; helping it grow and evolve, design wise. When he first arrived to the site, he had (still has) his own review show called The Cinema Kid . Reviewing all sorts of movies to Manos: The Hands of Fate to the recently released The Artist. When he isn't doing movie reviews, he sometimes does various acts in his videos. As soon as Manic Expression started to evolve, Oliver volunteered to help make designs of Expressionists shows, alongside Fusionater . Despite not being an administrator, Oliver Judd has gone on to be a helpful member of Manic Expression . Creating the new Manic Expression logo design for the front page. He has also designed logos for members who have asked him too do so but was often found designing for fun. A very helpful, self-less member, who can go along with Ratin8tor as one of the "unofficial admins" of the site. This is a guy thinks not of profit, only of wanting to help out. What a wonderful way to look at the world. This kid has talent - real talent. He could be charging us up the ass for his designs, and instead he often times simply volunteers them. Its what I love about this site. Not only do we get to come here and be creative, but we get to work with others and help make their dreams come true. What a wonderful thing we have going here, and its all thanks to people like my friend, Oliver Judd. I think we all owe him a big thank you for making our site not only a more ascetically pleasing place, but a kinder place as well. June On July 16th, Manic Expression is putting on a play. "The Manic Expression Podcast Plays" has almost every member involved; Les is putting on the score, pbMiranda is helping with her writing skills, alexthed is the announcer, and BigBlackHatMan , HedonisticActor, DeckerShado (along with many others) are contributing with their acting. There is, however, a person who plays a big part in the play. ThatLongHairedCreepyGuy (also known around some members as The Creepy One,) is the editor behind the play. He's taking Les' score, each members acting, and putting it all together in one big production on his own. He's taken the time to edit everything together, even taking long hours to contribute to this project. ThatLongHairedCreepyGuy joined Manic Expression on January 25th and was the host of Looking Back in Annoyance. He reviewed many obscure shows, has his own segment called The Garfield Retrospective. From then on, The Creepy One started to move onto obscure softcore and hardcore porn reviews with his, Midnight Wank Theatres. He doesn't judge the porn just by the sex. He judges how the plot holds up in the porn (no matter how mediocre or asinine it is) and THEN shows how sexy and titillating it is for the audience. He's also a writer of pornography and books as well (The Thirteenth Child ). The Creepy One is also an open bisexual, but no one gives him a hard time with his sexuality. This is a wonderful site, filled with different types of people who are so civil. Even when The Creepy One does put out some personal blogs with his type of tastes for porn stars, he's not afraid of what content to put, and the members don't even judge him harshly. He shares stories, life experiences, and even embarassing moments. On the Internet, that can be a damning thing to do, but he isn't afraid. He's not afraid of other people. In fact, he's genuinely nice to other people. Even though he takes the name "Creepy", he's far from it. He's charming, a good speaker, and quite possibly one of the nicest people from the south. ...And without That Long-Haired Creepy Guy, it would have been for nothing.If the Podcast Plays will have an unsung hero, its Creepy. No one worked as hard on this project as him. While balancing life and work, he managed to squeeze in hour upon hour of time spent at his computer, taking these elements that all of us gave him and beautifully weaving them together. Think about what a disaster this could have been: I’m acting opposite no one. I can’t hear or see the other actors, all I can do is read my lines and react to what I think the others might do. On top of that, we all have different microphones. Decker prides himself on his very professional mic, while all I had was the mic on my webcam. This should sound like shit, and yet it doesn’t. It sounds like we were all in the same room, playing off each other. We can thank Creepy for that.The Podcast Plays have provided me with a thrilling experience. Hearing others read my lines, watching this production come together, has been incredible. But for me personally, the best thing to come out of the whole shebang is working with and getting to know Creepy. He’s a great guy. '' July BigBlackHatMan has always been there for the members of Manic Expression. He's always the first one to comment on every blog and video released almost everyday. He is truly the kindest cowboy you'll ever meet. With his new series, ''Behind the Webcam and taking on a new persona of Wallace A. Bifdt von Huphle, IV, BigBlackHatMan has been putting himself through interviews of the most interesting "Expressionists" of the site. Ranging from the kind hearted Fusionater, to the recent anime enthusiast Madhog thy Master, Mark has become one of the great faces of the blogging site. Yes, the man is a pro...but the size of this guys heart is pretty impressive too. Behind the Webcam is the kind of show that only a wonderful guy like BBHM could dream up, and that only someone as talented as him could pull off. While others might make the show a little too schmaltzy, it was BBHM’s brilliant idea to celebrate members here while making us laugh. Never do we roll our eyes and sigh, as we might with a more sincere and earnest tribute. Instead we chuckle at the goofy voice, the giggle inducing questions, but at the end of the video we have a new appreciation for whatever Manic Expressionist we’ve just been introduced to. August While some of the administrators of the site don't know much about how it works (James confesses without hesitation to not knowing much about the mechanics along with Les), Fusionater has always been the guy to work, literally day and night with the site. Updating the front page, making the site look decent, and even fixing a few bugs that come into the mix every now and again. Fusionater may be young, but he works his fingers to the bone, day in and day out for countless hours; most nights without any sleep. THAT is why he deserves this honor. On day one of this site, this place was like an empty house - no paint on the walls, no furniture, no carpeting. I did what I could. I messed with some settings and picked out whatever templates were available. The front page consisted of the Stop the Hate logo for months because...well, I didn't know how to do anything but upload a picture. Then one day I woke up and the site was reborn. Oliver’s beautiful logo sat atop the front page like the star on a Christmas tree. The members had their own logos on the front page, linking to their work. There was suddenly order to the madness. I have a lot of people to thank for putting that together, but it was Fus who stepped up, took charge, and made everything come together. September Timdiana is the kind of person who really cares about all of the members, moderators and admins on Manic Expression. There are a lot of people on the site who like to do crossovers and such (the biggest one being Play-Mate of the Apes with Decker and TLHCG . As a matter of fact, that was a milestone). However, Tim was always a man to go to with open arms when it came to the Manic Expression Specials, all sorts of reviews, it doesn't matter. There are no bounds to what he will do for the site just for fun. Timdiana is a man with such high charisma and charm, that it's hard not to love his work and his character. '' Timdiana pretty much invented the crossover here on Manic Expression. I remember getting an email from him saying, "We've got to get people working together!" Pretty soon, Tim was putting together massive podcasts and inviting Expressionists like yours truly to join him on Timdiana the Reviews. He showed up in our first Podcast Play, he edited the 100 Member Special, you'll see him in Decker's upcoming Manic Expression documentary, and (ANNOUNCEMENT) he'll be returning to edit our 200 Member Special. '' Tim recognized that, in order for us to truly be a community, we had to start working together. I get ideas from him all the time about ways to make that happen. He's one of the big reasons this site is what it is. Tim really helped make Manic Expression a family. October For the theme of October, something special had to be done to make the Hallows Eve month all the more special to the site. That's when James Bevan stepped up to create Manic Expression's Monster Extravaganza. Taking influence from James Rolfe Monster Madness, this video game blogger decided to take his love for mythical, legendary, and deadly creatures and turn it into a daily blog post up until Halloween. James (or Jim as he likes to be called) puts a lot of love and research into all types of creatures, ranging from the ridiculous, Hodag to the frightening, deadly, and yet surreal Moth Man. Jim's passion for writing about such creatures have so much weight in every post and everything he says about each creature is always fascinating to the reader. Congratulations, Jim. Manic Expression's Monster Extravaganza is so much more than an examination of spooks we all know. James went out of his way to find myths and legends, some with a possible basis in fact, and to present us with detailed accounts of creatures we wouldn't neccesarily recognize. It was as much a learning tool as an entertaining examination of "monsters."'As amazing as the list was (seriously, dude, where did you find all those beasts?), what is truly amazing is the title. Manic Expression's Monster Extravaganza. Think about that. It could have been James Bevan's Monster Extravaganza. He didn't have to use the site name in the title. Think about what he's saying by using those two words, "Manic Expression." He's saying, "Manic Expression, this is for you." November Jockerlee77 is an avid blogger, despite his handicap when it comes to writing. Even though he makes a few spelling mistakes, that doesn't take away the fact that he is very passionate for the things he writes and how he presents news through videos. He's even made a novel, Park Slope. Just because someone has difficulty spelling words, doesn't mean they should take the title as a fool. Jocker seems to be FAR AWAY from that notion. He loves to talk about certain news stories and has a passion for giving every viewer his thoughts. One of the most sincere social commentors on the site. As a young boy, Jockerlee was struck by lead poisoning. This lead to many challenges in his ability to read, write, and pronounce certain words. Adding to these difficulties was a stint in the hospital years later after a severe burn. By the time he returned to regular classes, he was far behind the other kids in his ability to spell.Jockerlee first came to my attention here at Manic Expression early on. He posted blogs and videos regularly, and I found them to be exceptionally intelligent and thought provoking. I loved that someone was tackling serious topics here in their series, and from the beginning I counted him among our most valued contributors.It wasn’t until he emailed me, asking me to give my thoughts on a story he was writing, that I recognized how truly remarkable Jockerlee was. He told me of his condition, and I was blown away. For most people, having a hard time spelling and conveying your thoughts in a written format would detour them from trying. Here was a guy going through all that who not only wrote a regular blog series, but he was writing a friggin’ book!So many people without Jockerlee’s challenges waste their good fortune. They write hate filled tirades or spew intolerance, all with perfect spelling and punctuation. And yet right here at Manic Expression we have someone who knows the true value of what he’s doing. Since every word is a struggle, he never wastes one. His opinions are well thought out and concise, but more so they are always moral. Jockerlee struggles to get his thoughts across in his writing, and those thoughts are always kind.'''